Centralia’s Suppressed History Bared Deadly Labor Violence Of 1919 Will Be Recalled In Big Mural

For decades, the ugliness of events at the 1919 Armistice Day parade here muzzled residents into a tight-lipped silence.

Tensions between the town’s American Legionnaires and members of the Industrial Workers of the World union erupted into violence that day. When it was over, four Legionnaires had been killed by gunfire; one union member - Wesley Everest - had been hung in a lynching; and eight other union members were imprisoned. A Tenino farmer and posse member also died, accidentally shot by another vigilante.

The four Legionnaires are commemorated by a statute in George Washington Park downtown. The only memorial to Everest’s lynching is his headstone in a small cemetery north of Centralia.

“The monument in the park does not really convey what most people consider to be an accurate view of what took place,” said John Regan, co-owner of Centralia Square Antique Mall and the Centralia Factory Outlet Center near Interstate 5.

So this summer, Everest and other IWW members known as the Wobblies - will be honored in a downtown mural.

The community’s silence on the events of Nov. 11, 1919, was breached in 1983 when Peter Hendrickson, program administrator for the Centralia School District, began creating local history materials about them.

Before then, Hendrickson said, “it was an unspoken taboo that this was not an appropriate topic because it was so sensitive.”

But that has changed. In 1994, the Lewis County Historical Museum had an exhibit marking the events’ 75th anniversary.

And now, the mural.

Bill Henry, business representative of Local 612 of the International Union of Operating Engineers and co-chair of the mural project, said his great-grandfather, William Inmon, served on the 1920 jury in Montesano that sentenced eight Wobblies to lengthy prison sentences.

Two years later, Inmon and two other jurors submitted affidavits that said they believed the defendants were innocent, but that they had convicted them of lesser charges to save them from execution.

The mural “will finally tell the history that has been suppressed,” Henry said. “When you scrape back some of this history, you see people with real convictions and beliefs, and the kind of character to take a stand,” Regan said. “We want to make a statement. From my point of view, it’s communicating honestly about what took place.”

The mural, 30 feet wide and 25 feet high, will be painted on the back wall of Centralia Square Antique Mall.

The mural group intends to commission Mike Alewitz, a New Jersey-based labor muralist.

Brian Dow, a member of Local 2127 of the Carpenters Union, is enthusiastic about the mural.

“What happened back in 1919 is somewhat overdue for being put out there,” Dow said. “It’s Centralia history. It’s not going to hurt anything, and it’s good when people talk about things.”

Henry said it will be a tool for teaching people about the labor movement.

“It’s not us or them,” Henry said. “Labor is part of the community.”

The $8,000 estimated cost of the mural will be covered by donations from private individuals, labor organizations and businesses, Henry said.